The Cast of AMoK

Timmy bonds with a copy of The Art of War, "blooding" it in a fight against the Bronson brothers. Through Conroy's impossible library, he learns to assemble his blooded books into a book-armored, page-fleshed creature with glowing amber eyes — and names it AMOK. Over the course of one brutal weekend, he survives his stepfather Gordon's escalating abuse, is imprisoned in an underground bunker, discovers his mother Jane's murdered body, and directs AMOK to kill Gordon in the climax, which ends with Gordon's arms torn off and the house destroyed in a gas explosion. Gordon's body, like several others in the story, is never found. Timmy survives, returns to school as an unwilling minor celebrity, and ends the book having been confirmed as Conroy's chosen steward — his backpack now heavier with a second, unidentified book lashed to his healed copy of The Art of War, and a strange, unnaturally tall figure (implied to be the antagonist Despicio, still alive) watching him from across the street.

Conroy is revealed to also go by "Zenodotus" — a nod to the historical first librarian of the Library of Alexandria. He is an ancient, enigmatic keeper of a non-Euclidean pocket-dimension "library" that distributes blooded, magical books to needful readers, and has a centuries-old rivalry with the antagonist, Mr. Despicio — the two were once worshipped as opposing deities. He guides Timmy throughout the story, gifts Detective De Bakey her own forgotten childhood book as proof of his uncanny knowledge, and confirms Timmy as his chosen steward by the story's end. His own physical injuries throughout the book are implied to be partial payment for the power he channels.

An ancient, shapeshifting entity attempting to fully manifest a "true body" into this plane via a metamorphic "chrysalis" process that requires human flesh and misery. He has already murdered and consumed an elderly couple, the Finnbarrs, and taken their house and identity. A centuries-old rival of Conroy/Zenodotus, he psychologically manipulates Gordon, sabotages Detective De Bakey's car to injure her, and sabotages the climactic house's gas lines to try to kill everyone inside. He survives the story's ending and is shown still watching Timmy from across the street in the Epilogue, setting up future installments.

Born Gordon Herron, he changed his surname to hide a pattern of murdering blood relatives (staged as accidents or overdoses) to inherit his dying Uncle Milton's fortune. He has been sexually abusing his stepdaughter Theresa for years and begins turning his predatory attention toward his toddler stepdaughter Tammy. He owns a hidden second property with an underground bunker of padlocked cells, where he has kept Theresa imprisoned and, later in the story, murders his wife Jane and imprisons Timmy. In the climax, he is confronted by the book-monster AMOK; when he sets one of AMOK's constituent books on fire with his signature lighter, AMOK tears off both of his arms and continues burning him as the house explodes. His body is never recovered; he is presumed dead.

Willfully blind to, and complicit in, Gordon's abuse of Theresa, rationalizing it to herself for years. She only becomes alarmed once Gordon's predatory attention shifts to toddler Tammy — but before she can act, Theresa disappears. Jane is murdered by Gordon (her throat cut) prior to the story's climax; her body is discovered by Timmy and Mark in Gordon's underground bunker.

Sexually abused by Gordon for years, Theresa confided to Mark that she had an unrevealed "plan" for dealing with Gordon shortly before she disappeared. She has been held captive in the third cell of Gordon's underground bunker the entire time — bound and gagged, but alive. In the climax, AMOK tears the cell open and pulls her free moments before the house explodes. She recovers in the hospital and gives Detective De Bakey the testimony that finally unravels the full extent of Gordon's crimes.

Secretly in love with Theresa, Mark defies a detective's direct order to stay put and infiltrates Gordon's secret house, discovering the underground bunker and Jane's body alongside Timmy. In the climax, he helps rescue Timmy from the burning house and detours to save the twins, Todd and Tammy, from the truck — an act that makes him a town hero afterward.

Reports Gordon's abuse of Timmy to the school administration early in the story — without result, underscoring the novel's theme of protective systems that fail. She does not appear in the climax itself.

De Bakey uncovers the pattern behind Gordon's Herron-family murders and the connection to Theresa's disappearance and the vanished Finnbarr couple. She becomes entangled in events she can't rationally explain, including being gifted her own long-lost childhood copy of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Conroy through Timmy. She's injured in a car accident secretly orchestrated by Despicio, defies orders to get back in the field, and arrives just in time to help pull Timmy and Mark from the exploding house. Afterward, she and Timmy never discuss what really happened, a silence she maintains to protect her own sanity.

Urges Detective De Bakey early on to look more closely at Gordon. After the climax, she moves in to help care for the surviving McFarland children.

Sons of a disabled, alcoholic Vietnam veteran, the brothers corner and threaten Timmy early in the story and are quickly defeated once Timmy's blooded book empowers him. In the Epilogue, believing (mistakenly) that Theresa had died, they apologize to Timmy anyway, revealing she used to babysit them and that they had genuinely liked her — a small, redemptive final beat for the pair.